Proving he was full of surprises, he said, "Is this about what happened between us in your room?"
"No, this is about you telling me what to do. You have no right."
He groaned and fixed his gaze on the ceiling. "I'm sorry we parted on such angry terms."
"I wasn't angry."
"You're angry now."
"No, I'm...never mind. Now is neither the time nor the place to discuss it." I risked a glance at George. He was staring out the window a little too hard for me to believe he was interested in the scenery whizzing past at an astonishing rate. "Aren't you going to tell the driver to go to Clerkenwell?" I asked him.
"We'll return to my house first," George said. "I have a pair of old dueling pistols that belonged to my grandfather in the study."
"Pistols! Do you think that's necessary?"
George nodded grimly. Jacob nodded, equally grim. "There was another victim last night," he said.
I gasped and put a gloved hand to my mouth as bile filled it. "Oh God." I told George what Jacob had said. He removed his glasses and squeezed the bridge of his nose.
"Another footman," Jacob said. "Later on, the house where he worked was burgled. There was no sign of forced entry."
I passed the information onto George, all the while trying
not to think what a shape-shifting demon could do to a poor, unarmed man.
"This is awful," George said with undisguised horror. "It's looking more and more like the person or persons who summoned the demon are directing it to take on the form of its victim in order to gain access to the house where he worked." He screwed his top lip up and shook his head. "For money," he spat. "Despicable."
We were all silent for some time after that.
"Did you speak to the footman's ghost?" I eventually asked Jacob.
He nodded. "He couldn't tell me anything useful. He thought a wild dog or a bear had killed him. He said it came out of nowhere, from the shadows. When I explained what happened he decided to stay in the Waiting Area until the demon is returned to the Otherworld."
We remained silent until the carriage stopped outside George's house and he got out. Finally I was alone with Jacob. But after the terrible news, I didn't want to argue with him anymore. I just wanted to hold him and be held by him.
On the other hand I couldn't allow the opportunity to speak pass me by. I might not get another one.
"You failed to finish your story last night," I said.